Move multiple servers onto a single
physical host with performance and fault isolation provided at the
virtual machine boundaries.

Hardware Independence.

Allow legacy applications and operating
systems to exploit new hardware.

Multiple OS configurations.

Run multiple operating systems
simultaneously, for development or testing purposes.

Kernel Development.

Test and debug kernel modifications in a
sand-boxed virtual machine -- no need for a separate test machine.

Cluster Computing.

Management at VM granularity provides more
flexibility than separately managing each physical host, but better
control and isolation than single-system image solutions,
particularly by using live migration for load balancing.

Hardware support for custom OSes.

Allow development of new
OSes while benefiting from the wide-ranging hardware support of
existing OSes such as Linux.